Time for another ' Throwback Thursday ' post! One of the lovely things that we've been up to over the past months was having B...

Thursday, December 01, 2016

Throwback Thursday - Finding Nemo

Thursday, December 01, 2016
BookBairn Blog
10 Comments

Time for another 'Throwback Thursday' post! One of the lovely things that we've been up to over the past months was having BookBairn's grandparents (you may notice they lovingly and dutifully comment on every post!) stay locally for a week and they got to join in with lots of our activities as well as take us out for a few fun trips! One of the best trips we went on was to the local aquarium.I should begin by saying that BookBairn had recently become rather fascinated by some clownfish stickers that are part of a reusable sticker pad that she adores. So we watched Nemo and Papa BookBairn had picked her up a light-up clownfish toy. So simply we told her we were going to the aquarium to find Nemo. But we found so much more! The first tank was full of terrapins and she loved spotting the 'turtles'; she was fascinated by the sea lions in their outdoor enclosure, especially as they came right up to where we stood to say hello; she liked seeing the snakes; she enjoyed crawling through the little tunnel and popping up to find a tank full of Nemos and Dorys and seahorses! (She loved the penguins but I'm saving them for another post!) And of course we visited the shop and Papa wanted to buy her something. Now, we were all worried she would want one of those ridiculously overpriced giant cuddly toys and Papa would be spending a fortune. But instead she chose two very small plastic clownfish toys at 40p each! A great day out!

That was until the next day she literally lost Nemo on our walk home from yoga. Half way home she said "mummy, dropped Nemo" and of course, I trailed all the way back to the yoga studio scouring the pavements for the tiny fish! We couldn't find him. She declared, "Nemo lost. Very sad." I was disappointed for her but at least she learned a valuable lesson. Well, we popped out to the library that afternoon, walking along the same road and you'll surely have guessed... we found teeny tiny Nemo!

A fantastic book that encourages little ones to hunt under the sea for some of their favourite creatures - a starfish, a jellyfish and a clownfish! But it's a bit more meaningful than that. 'Where's Starfish?' by Barroux is a wonderful wordless picture book about the effects of pollution on our oceans. Sounds pretty hard-hitting for little ones but this book is pitched so perfectly!

As children turn the pages, Starfish, Clownfish and Jellyfish all become harder to spot due to the ever-growing amount of rubbish being dumped in the ocean. The first pages feature mainly other beautifully vibrant coloured fish amongst which our little sea creatures are hiding, but then as more and more rubbish appears more and more fish disappear until there is only our three heroes, a whale and a mountain of rubbish. Finally, whale takes action and pushes all the rubbish back to the shoreline and on to the beach, refusing to tolerate the trash any longer! I was skeptical as to how powerful this book could be without any words, and yet somehow it is even more powerful! And BookBairn enjoys the story even without the consistency of reading sentences aloud. We talk about the pictures and to be honest a lot of her understanding of stories still comes from the illustrations anyway. This book is delightfully colourful and Barroux's illustrations do huge justice to an important message!

On the final page of the book Barroux states that he was inspired to create this book after seeing a plastic bag on the beach that looked like a jellyfish prompting him to write a book about the threat of pollution to our waterways and oceans. He says "we must protect these important underwater kingdoms for the creatures that live in them, and everyone needs to remember to take litter home and put it in the bin!" Taking this message to heart, I love that the edition of the book that we have has been printed on forest friendly paper showing that the publisher values Barroux's environmental message too!

Barroux has created a series of similar books with big themes for little readers and I intend to collect them all. I recently bought 'Welcome', the story of some polar bears seeking asylum after their iceberg has melted, and have 'Where's Elephant?', a story about deforestation, at the top of my to-buy list! And honestly, I can't wait for more.

Hope you have as much luck Finding Nemo!

Mummy and BookBairn x

Click on the images above to find these books on amazon.co.uk

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10 comments:

I still remember the "Wow" BookBairn exclaimed when she saw the first tank of fish. It was a great day out and finding Nemo on the way to the library was just amazing. I love the idea and message in Where's the Starfish. BookBairn will certainly be encouraged to put her rubbish in the appropriate place.

Oh I love the look of this book, my one year old is obsessed with fish at the moment so I may need to add this to his Xmas list. So glad you found Nemo, I've had to do similar hunts for lost toys before too! #readwithme

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